As fashion’s favourite musical chairs enjoy another round, British Vogue looks back at some of the seminal last collections from creative directors at the top of their game.
LEADING LIGHT
Model and actor Gwendoline Christie walks on water in silk-taffeta-mad, nip-waisted glory. Maison Margiela Artisanal designed by John Galliano throughout. Fashion Editor: Olivier Rizzo.Photographed by Steven Meisel, Vogue, May 2024.
Marc Jacobs for Louis Vuitton SS14
Marc Jacobs’s final bow for the sleepy luggage brand he resuscitated – thanks to his agenda-setting collaborations with Stephen Sprouse, Takashi Murakami and Yayoi Kusama – was a “good-bye” said Vogue’s Nicole Phelps, who watched the tribute to his 16-year tenure at Louis Vuitton play out from the front row. Despite only confirming his exit after the presentation, the “writing was on the wall”, as Edie Campbell opened the show in a nude bodysuit scrawled with Sprouse’s signature penmanship, surrounded by sets – the elevator, escalator, carousel and fountain – from Jacobs’s past. “To the showgirl in all of us,” signed off Jacobs, who paid tribute to the design greats – Coco, Rei, Miuccia – with a collection that had none of the funereal feel an all-black edit might have. It was, by all accounts, as defiantly dramatic as one would expect from the king of collaborations and truly cult collections. Alice Newbold
Louis Vuitton SS14.
Rindoff/Dufour/Getty ImagesChristopher Bailey for Burberry AW18
He presided over a golden era at Burberry, so Christopher Bailey’s autumn/winter 2018 show – a curtain call after his 17-year tenure as chief creative officer – was always going to be emotional. Bailey, whose grunge-y, muso vision for the house was integral to what would come to be known as indie sleaze, made his final runway a vibrant love letter to the provincial, sticky-floored northern nightclubs that were the scene of his personal fashion awakening, as well as British street culture in the ’80s and ’90s and unabashed queer joy. Think: Burberry check baseball caps paired with colour-pop logo sweatshirts (reclaiming those relics of the era in which a spate of licensing deals diluted its luxury status), shellsuit tops and neon beanies, and for the closing look, a billowing rainbow flag cloak with check lining, worn by a smiling, swaggering Cara Delevingne. Kate Moss was first in line to congratulate the beloved designer – who has since swapped Prorsum for the Potteries – with a bear hug. Kerry McDermott
Burberry AW18.
Samir HusseinMatthieu Blazy for Bottega Veneta SS25
Matthieu Blazy’s tenure as creative director at Bottega Veneta will be remembered as one of the most swift and successful house makeovers in recent fashion history – it catapulted him straight to the head of Chanel after just three years at the helm. His final show for spring/summer 2025 played out along a runway lined with giant cartoon animal beanbags – rabbits, chickens, whales – rendered in the supplest of leathers, and created in collaboration with Milanese furniture company Zanotta. Models wore looks that distilled Blazy’s core philosophy of elevating the everyday, from plaid shirt and jeans combos crafted from ultra-fine leather to liquid-silk georgette gowns accessorised with diaphanous, glycerin-treated leather carrier bags, crocheted leather bouquets of flowers and, most memorably, micro-fronded leather wigs. A case study in leaving on a high, it was a triumphant testament to the designer’s winning formula of exquisite craft injected with childlike whimsy – which he continues to showcase in his new gig. Mahoro Seward
Bottega Veneta SS25.
Launchmetrics.com/spotlightDemna for Balenciaga AW25 Haute Couture
As Demna prepared to hand over the reins to Pierpaolo Piccioli before taking the helm at Gucci, his Balenciaga Haute Couture autumn/winter 2025 collection tied together all those loose threads in one star-studded, semi-ironic bow. In homage to the designer’s decade spent blurring the lines between fashion, celebrity and internet culture, Kim Kardashian took to the runway draped in a faux-mink coat and a nude slip dress, accessorised with Elizabeth Taylor’s actual diamond earrings. As the parade continued, with Naomi Campbell in a slinky sequined gown, Demna’s study of “la bourgeoisie” dresscodes ended with a personal tribute to everyone who had worked with him during his near-decade-long tenure. Olivia Allen
Courtesy of Balenciaga
Jonathan Anderson for Loewe SS25
Rumours that Jonathan Anderson was heading to Dior had reached fever pitch by the time the Northern Irish designer showed his final women’s pring/summer 2025 collection for Loewe, the Spanish house he’d led for 11 years and transformed into a cutting edge but commercially successful juggernaut. Loewe’s front rows were filled with distinctly interesting stars, which had other luxury houses frantically rethinking their VIP strategies. For his last bow, it was Taylor Russell, Luca Guadagnino and Zadie Smith, alongside designers including Sarah Burton and Pieter Mulier, who were all out of their seats for the standing ovation. Through strokes of genius, Loewe’s collections transformed cerebral and academic references into must-own designs, and Anderson’s white box show space, with a Tracey Emin bird perched in its centre, riffed on everything his acolytes had grown to adore: architectural sequin minidresses, playful leatherwork and billowing proportions – silhouettes that transformed a staid leather house into a leader in every fashion conversation. Laura Hawkins
Loewe SS25.
Raf Simons for Jil Sander AW12
It’s a runway bow that lives rent free in the minds of fashion obsessives: when Raf Simons took his second and last goodbye on the Jil Sander autumn/winter 2012 runway – which he had creatively presided over for seven years – he held a quivering hand up to his tear-streaked face. Simons had received a standing ovation and jubilant applause for his work at the restrained German brand, which saw him return to the runway for not one but two bows, after a swansong womenswear collection, featuring sumptuous and streamlined duster coats, bustier dresses and voluminous skirts in a colour palette that pivoted from blush pink to lilac, red and silver, and, finally, a fittingly funereal black. Simons took up the prestigious role of womenswear artistic director of Dior two months later, and the 2014 Frédéric Tcheng-directed documentary Dior and I, which charted the Belgian designer’s debut haute couture collection for the maison, also spawned another magic Simons moment: him weeping openly backstage as models take to the catwalk, comforted by his then right-hand, Pieter Mulier. LH
Jil Sander AW12.
GIUSEPPE CACACE/Getty ImagesJean Paul Gaultier Haute Couture SS20
Few designers can lay claim to having genuinely shaped the course of fashion history in their image. Even fewer can lay claim to having done so over a period of 50 years. One of them, though, is Jean Paul Gaultier. For the demi-centennial celebration of his reign, it was only natural to expect that fashion’s campest would pull out all the stops, staging an all-singing, all-dancing spectacle at the Théâtre du Châtelet – which also included a mock funeral as part of the proceedings. A parade of the designer’s greatest hits over five decades – cone bras, sleazy sailors and (literally!) breath-taking corsetry galore – the finale brought an intergenerational panoply of muses and supermodels – Bella and Gigi Hadid, Irina Shayk, Yasmin Le Bon, Farida Khelfa and Beatrice Dalle – to the stage, their presence a testament to the magnitude and resonance of the influence of one of fashion’s undisputed greats. MS
Jean Paul Gaultier Haute Couture SS20.
WWD/Getty ImagesKim Jones for Dior AW25
Kim Jones’s autumn/winter 2025 collection for Dior rivalled his autumn/winter 2017 outing for Louis Vuitton in standing ovations alone. But this was his most beautiful. “The customer wants to see something new,” he told the press backstage. “Fashion has gotten very, very fast. I think social media has made people’s attention span very, very short, and so hype can sometimes win over craft.” And so, Kim stripped things back to source: drawing on the architecture of Dior’s “H-Line” haute couture collection of autumn/winter 1954 in linear tailoring with tucked waists, pink silk faille swing coats and belted kimonos. And, as rumours continued to swirl around Dior’s all-but-confirmed leadership changes, Jones sent his models into a symbolic unknown, their eyes obscured by blindfold ribbons, nobly accepting their fate. Not long after the house lights dimmed, friends and admirers of Jones (including Anna Wintour, Kate Moss, Gwendoline Christie, Robert Pattinson, Lulu Kennedy and Rick Owens) gathered to see the designer knighted as a Chevalier de la Légion d’Honneur – France’s highest civilian award. Daniel Rodgers
Dior AW25.
Martin Margiela SS09
Staged amidst rumours that he might be preparing to retire, Martin Margiela’s 20th-anniversary show was not a sentimental trip down memory lane, but a demonstration of the enduring relevance of two decades of work. Pieces from his earliest collections sat alongside newer creations, from the narrow, puffed-shouldered jacket of his 1988 debut to the sharp shoulders that prompted a silhouette shift in 2006. The designer’s longstanding fascination with trompe-l’œil and the wonderful world of wigs was also at play, with models’ faces concealed beneath flesh-toned masks or sculptural flops of synthetic hair. The show culminated in a multi-tiered birthday-cake gown and a marching band, accompanied by lab-coated assistants, who joined the celebrations as the models peeled off their makeshift masks for the jubilant finale. OA
Martin Margiela SS09.
Fairchild Archive/Getty ImagesNicolas Ghesquière for Balenciaga SS13
There were gasps when it was announced two months after Nicolas Ghesquière's spring/summer 2013 show for Balenciaga, that he was leaving the brand he’d led for 15 years, because he’d “ended up feeling too alone” at the house. It’s highly unlikely his front-row guests – including Kristen Stewart – felt anything but connection to his final designs for the house, which featured voluminous ruffled skirts and boxy crop tops, tweed miniskirts and tabards with golden buttons and bold laser-cut leather dresses. Ghesquière's cutting-edge silhouettes were just a hint of his retro-futuristic, time-hopping aesthetic, which has now defined his 13-year tenure at Louis Vuitton. Luckily for now, the only expressions coming from the front row of those shows are smiles. LH
Balenciaga SS13.
John Galliano for Maison Margiela Artisanal SS24
Weeks before John Galliano’s Pont Alexandre III spectacular, on a rain-soaked night that transported press back to the Paris of the 1930s, Gwendoline Christie had been obsessively requesting archival Galliano references from her editor friends. When the night itself rolled around, and the corseted actor emerged – all hourglass curves and Pat McGrath-perfected glass skin – it was clear she was method acting her way around the debauched haunt, while proving the power of fashion to enchant, provoke and enthral. “The fashion world shifted tonight,” said Mark Guiducci, formerly of Vogue, now at the helm of Vanity Fair. He was not wrong. This Galliano collection, like many of his others at Givenchy, Dior and under his own name, will forever be referenced as agenda setting and unequivocally original. AN
Maison Margiela Artisanal SS24.
Anthony Vaccarello for Saint Laurent SS27
Anthony Vaccarello’s last Saint Laurent show – basked in the aureate glow of the Eiffel Tower (the site of some of his greatest triumphs) beneath a series of improbably suspended gilt chandeliers – was a testament to what a golden reign was at the house. Literally. Rather than reinvent the wheel season after season, the Belgian-born designer’s formula for success has been the simplest you could think of – consistency, repetition. A knack he paid tribute to by presenting a collection dripping in gold. Laminated leathers, rich brocades, scintillating bouclés – no fabric, surface or treatment was spared the designer’s Midas touch – save for the gemstone-tone chiffon scarves that trailed behind looks, or the odd bejewelled turban à la Loulou de la Falaise. Looking at the monotone procession – watched by the likes of Zoë Kravitz, Rosalía and Donatella Versace – you couldn’t help but be reminded of the age-old fashion swansong tradition of presenting a funereal, all-black collection (a nod to which came with the show’s closing suite of exquisite inky eveningwear.) What a 24-karat run it was. MS
Saint Laurent SS27.
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